COMMENTARY.
An Essay.] The poem is in one book, but divided into three principal parts or members. The first, to ver. 201, gives rules for the study of the art of criticism: the second, from thence to ver. 560, exposes the causes of wrong judgment: and the third, from thence to the end, marks out the morals of the critic.
In order to a right conception of this poem, it will be necessary to observe, that though it be entitled simply An Essay on Criticism, yet several of the precepts relate equally to the good writing as well as to the true judging of a poem. This is so far from violating the unity of the subject, that it preserves and completes it: or from disordering the regularity of the form, that it adds beauty to it, as will appear by the following considerations: 1. It was impossible to give a full and exact idea of the art of poetical criticism, without considering at the same time the art of poetry; so far as poetry is an art. These therefore being closely connected in nature, the author has, with much judgment, interwoven the precepts of each reciprocally through his whole poem. 2. As the rules of the ancient critics were taken from poets who copied nature, this is another reason why every poet should be a critic: therefore as the subject is poetical criticism, it is frequently addressed to the critical poet. And 3dly, the art of criticism is as properly, and much more usefully exercised in writing than in judging.
But readers have been misled by the modesty of the title, which only promises an art of criticism, to expect little, where they will find a great deal,—a treatise, and that no incomplete one, of the art both of criticism and poetry. This, and the not attending to the considerations offered above, was what, perhaps misled a very candid writer, after having given the Essay on Criticism all the praises on the side of genius and poetry which his true taste could not refuse it, to say, that "the observations follow one another like those in Horace's Art of Poetry, without that methodical regularity which would have been requisite in a prose writer." Spect. No. 235. I do not see how method can hurt any one grace of poetry: or what prerogative there is in verse to dispense with regularity. The remark is false in every part of it. Mr. Pope's Essay on Criticism, the reader will soon see, is a regular piece, and a very learned critic has lately shown that Horace had the same attention to method in his Art of Poetry. See Mr. Hurd's Comment on the Epistle to the Pisos.[297]
Ver. 1. 'Tis hard to say, &c.] The poem opens, from ver. 1 to 9, with showing the use and seasonableness of the subject. Its use, from the greater mischief in wrong criticism than in ill poetry—this only tiring, that misleading the reader. Its seasonableness, from the growing number of bad critics, which now vastly exceeds that of bad poets.
Ver. 9. 'Tis with our judgments, &c.] The author having shown us the expediency of his subject, the art of criticism, inquires next, from ver. 8 to 15, into the proper qualities of a true critic, and observes first, that judgment alone is not sufficient to constitute this character, because judgment, like the artificial measures of time, goes different, and yet each man relies upon his own. The reasoning is conclusive, and the similitude extremely just. For judgment, when it is alone, is generally regulated, or at least much influenced, by custom, fashion, and habit; and never certain and constant but when founded upon and accompanied by taste, which is in the critic, what in the poet we call genius. Both are derived from heaven, and like the sun, the natural measure of time, always constant and equable.
Judgment alone, it is allowed, will not make a poet; where is the wonder then, that it will not make a critic in poetry? For on examination we shall find, that genius and taste are but one and the same faculty, differently exerting itself under different names, in the two professions of poetry and criticism. The art of poetry consists in selecting, out of all those images which present themselves to the fancy, such of them as are truly beautiful; and the art of criticism in discerning, and fully relishing what it finds so selected. The main difference is, that in the poet, this faculty is eminently joined to a bright imagination, and extensive comprehension, which provide stores for the selection, and can form that selection, by proportioned parts, into a regular whole: in the critic, it is joined to a solid judgment and accurate discernment, which can penetrate into the causes of an excellence, and display that excellence in all its variety of lights. Longinus had taste in an eminent degree; therefore, this quality, which all true critics have in common, our author makes his distinguishing character:
Thee, bold Longinus! all the Nine inspire,
And bless their critic with a poet's fire.
i. e. with taste, or genius.
Ver. 15. Let such teach others, &c.] But it is not enough that the critic hath these natural endowments of judgment and taste, to entitle him to exercise his art; he should, as our author shows us, from ver. 14 to 19, in order to give a further test of his qualification, have put them successfully into use. And this on two accounts: 1. Because the office of a critic is an exercise of authority. 2. Because he being naturally as partial to his judgment as the poet is to his wit, his partiality would have nothing to correct it, as that of the person judged hath by the very terms. Therefore some test is necessary; and the best and most unexceptionable, is his having written well himself—an approved remedy against critical partiality, and the surest means of so maturing the judgment as to reap with glory what Longinus calls "the last and most perfect fruits of much study and experience." Η γαρ των λογων κρισις πολλης εστι πειρας τελευταιον επιγεννημα.
Ver. 19. Yet, if we look, &c.] But the author having been thus free with the fundamental quality of criticism, judgment, so as to charge it with inconstancy and partiality, and to be often warped by custom and affection, that he may not be misunderstood, he next explains, from ver. 18 to 36, the nature of judgment, and the accidents occasioning those miscarriages before objected to it. He owns, that the seeds of judgment are indeed sown in the minds of most men, but by ill culture, as it springs up, it generally runs wild, either on the one hand, by false learning, which pedants call philology, and by false reasoning, which philosophers call school-learning, or, on the other, by false wit, which is not regulated by sense, and by false politeness, which is solely regulated by the fashion. Both these sorts, who have their judgment thus doubly depraved, the poet observes, are naturally turned to censure and abuse, only with this difference, that the learned dunce always affects to be on the reasoning, and the unlearned fool on the laughing side. And thus, at the same time, our author proves the truth of his introductory observation, that the number of bad critics is vastly superior to that of bad poets.
Ver. 36. Some have at first for wits, &c.] The poet having enumerated, in this account of the nature of judgment and its various depravations, the several sorts of bad critics, and ranked them into two general classes, as the first sort,—namely, the men spoiled by false learning—are but few in comparison of the other, and likewise come less within his main view (which is poetical criticism) but keep grovelling at the bottom amongst words and syllables, he thought it enough for his purpose here, just to have mentioned them, proposing to do them right hereafter. But the men spoiled by false taste are innumerable, and these are his proper concern. He therefore, from ver. 35 to 46, subdivides them again into the two classes of the volatile and heavy. He describes, in few words, the quick progression of the one through criticism, from false wit to plain folly, where they end; and the fixed station of the other, between the confines of both; who under the name of witlings, have neither end nor measure. A kind of half-formed creature from the equivocal generation of vivacity and dulness, like those on the banks of Nile, from heat and mud.
Ver. 46. But you who seek, &c.] Our author having thus far, by way of introduction, explained the nature, use, and abuse of criticism, in a figurative description of the qualities and characters of critics, proceeds now to deliver the precepts of the art. The first of which, from ver. 45 to 68, is, that he who sets up for a critic should previously examine his own strength, and see how far he is qualified for the exercise of his profession. He puts him in a way to make this discovery, in that admirable direction given ver. 51.
And mark that point where sense and dulness meet.
He had shown above, that judgment, without taste or genius, is equally incapable of making a critic or a poet. In whatsoever subject then the critic's taste no longer accompanies his judgment, there he may be assured he is going out of his depth. This our author finely calls,
that point where sense and dulness meet.
and immediately adds the reason of his precept, the author of nature having so constituted the mental faculties, that one of them can never greatly excel, but at the expense of another. From this state of co-ordination in the mental faculties, and the influence and effects they have upon one another, the poet draws this consequence, that no one genius can excel in more than one art or science. The consequence shows the necessity of the precept, just as the premises, from which the consequence is drawn, show the reasonableness of it.
Ver. 68. First follow nature, &c.] The critic observing the directions before given, and now finding himself qualified for his office, is shown next how to exercise it. And as he was to attend to nature for a call, so he is first and principally to follow nature when called. And here again in this, as in the foregoing precept, our poet, from ver. 67 to 88, shows both the fitness and necessity of it. I. Its fitness. 1. Because nature is the source of poetic art, this art being only a representation of nature, who is its great exemplar and original. 2. Because nature is the end of art, the design of poetry being to convey the knowledge of nature in the most agreeable manner. 3. Because nature is the test of art, as she is unerring, constant, and still the same. Hence the poet observes, that as nature is the source, she conveys life to art; as she is the end, she conveys force to it, for the force of any thing arises from its being directed to its end; and as she is the test, she conveys beauty to it, for everything acquires beauty by its being reduced to its true standard. Such is the sense of these two important lines,
Life, force, and beauty must to all impart,
At once the source, and end, and test of art.
II. The necessity of the precept is seen from hence. The two constituent qualities of a composition, as such, are art and wit; but neither of these attains perfection, till the first be hid, and the other judiciously restrained. This only happens when nature is exactly followed; for then art never makes a parade; nor can wit commit an extravagance. Art, while it adheres to nature, and has so large a fund in the resources which nature supplies, disposes every thing with so much ease and simplicity, that we see nothing but those natural images it works with, while itself stands unobserved behind; but when art leaves nature, misled either by the bold sallies of fancy, or the quaint oddness of fashion, she is then obliged at every step to come forward, in a painful or pompous ostentation, in order to cover, to soften, or to regulate the shocking disproportion of unnatural images. In the first case, our poet compares art to the soul within, informing a beauteous body; but in the last, we are bid to consider it but as a mere outward garb, fitted only to hide the defects of a misshapen one. As to wit, it might perhaps be imagined that this needed only judgment to govern it; but, as he well observes,
wit and judgment often are at strife,
Though meant each other's aid, like man and wife.
They want therefore some friendly mediator; and this mediator is nature: and in attending to nature, judgment will learn where he should comply with the charms of wit; and wit how she ought to obey the sage directions of judgment.
Ver. 88. Those rules of old, &c.] Having thus, in his first precept, to follow nature, settled criticism on its true foundation; he proceeds to show, what assistance may be had from art. But lest this should be thought to draw the critic from the ground where our poet had before fixed him, he previously observes, from ver. 87 to 92, that these rules of art, which he is now about to recommend to the critic's observance, were not invented by abstract speculation; but discovered in the book of nature; and that therefore, though they may seem to restrain nature by laws, yet as they are laws of her own making, the critic is still properly in the very liberty of nature. These rules the ancient critics borrowed from the poets, who received them immediately from nature.
Just precepts thus from great examples giv'n,
These drew from them what they derived from heav'n,
so that both are to be well studied.
Ver. 92. Hear how learn'd Greece, &c.] He speaks of the ancient critics first, and with great judgment, as the previous knowledge of them is necessary for reading the poets, with that fruit which the end here proposed requires. But having, in the foregoing observation, sufficiently explained the nature of ancient criticism, he enters on the subject treated of from ver. 91 to 118, with a sublime description of its end; which was to illustrate the beauties of the best writers, in order to excite others to an emulation of their excellence. From the raptures which these ideas inspire, the poet is brought back, by the follies of modern criticism, now before his eyes, to reflect on its base degeneracy. And as the restoring the art to its original purity and splendour is the great purpose of this poem, he first takes notice of those, who seem not to understand that nature is exhaustless; that new models of good writing may be produced in every age; and consequently, that new rules may be formed from these models, in the same manner as the old critics formed theirs, which was, from the writings of the ancient poets: but men wanting art and ability to form these new rules, were content to receive and file up for use, the old ones of Aristotle, Quintilian, Longinus, Horace, &c. with the same vanity and boldness that apothecaries practise, with their doctors' bills: and then rashly applying them to new originals (cases which they did not hit) it was no more in their power, than in their inclination, to imitate the candid practice of the ancients when
The gen'rous critic fanned the poet's fire,
And taught the world with reason to admire.
For, as ignorance, when joined with humility, produces stupid admiration, on which account it is commonly observed to be the mother of devotion and blind homage, so when joined with vanity (as it always is in bad critics) it gives birth to every iniquity of impudent abuse and slander. See an example (for want of a better) in a late ridiculous and now forgotten thing, called the Life of Socrates;[298] where the head of the author (as a man of wit observed) has just made a shift to do the office of a camera obscura, and represent things in an inverted order, himself above, and Sprat, Rollin, Voltaire, and every other writer of reputation, below.
Ver. 118. You then whose judgment, &c.] He comes next to the ancient poets, the other and more intimate commentators of nature, and shows, from ver. 117 to 141, that the study of these must indispensably follow that of the ancient critics, as they furnish us with what the critics, who only give us general rules, cannot supply, while the study of a great original poet, in
His fable, subject, scope in ev'ry page:
Religion, country, genius of his age;
will help us to those particular rules which only can conduct us safely through every considerable work we undertake to examine; and without which, we may cavil indeed, as the poet truly observes, but can never criticise. We might as well suppose that Vitruvius's book alone would make a perfect judge of architecture, without the knowledge of some great master-piece of science, such as the rotunda at Rome, or the temple of Minerva at Athens, as that Aristotle's should make a perfect judge of wit, without the study of Homer and Virgil. These therefore he principally recommends to complete the critic in his art. But as the latter of these poets has, by superficial judges, been considered rather as a copier of Homer, than an original from nature, our author obviates that common error, and shows it to have arisen (as often error does) from a truth, viz., that Homer and nature were the same; that the ambitious young poet, though he scorned to stoop at anything short of nature, when he came to understand this great truth, had the prudence to contemplate nature in the place where she was seen to most advantage, collected in all her charms in the clear mirror of Homer. Hence it would follow, that though Virgil studied nature, yet the vulgar reader would believe him to be a copier of Homer; and though he copied Homer, yet the judicious reader would see him to be an imitator of nature, the finest praise which any one, who came after Homer, could receive.
Ver. 141. Some beauties yet no precepts can declare, &c.] Our author, in these two general directions for studying nature and her commentators, having considered poetry as it is, or may be reduced to rule, lest this should be mistaken as sufficient to attain perfection either in writing or judging, he proceeds from ver. 140 to 201, to point up to those sublimer beauties which rules will never reach, nor enable us either to execute or taste,—beauties, which rise so high above all precept as not even to be described by it; but being entirely the gift of heaven, art and reason have no further share in them than just to regulate their operations. These sublimities of poetry (like the mysteries of religion, some of which are above reason, and some contrary to it) may be divided into two sorts, such as are above rules, and such as are contrary to them.
Ver. 146. If, where the rules, &c.] The first sort our author describes from ver. 145 to 152, and shows that where a great beauty is in the poet's view, which no stated rules will authorise him how to reach, there, as the purpose of rules is only to attain an end like this, a lucky licence will supply the place of them: nor can the critic fairly object, since this licence, for the reason given above, has the proper force and authority of a rule.
Ver. 152. Great wits sometimes may gloriously offend, &c.] He describes next the second sort, the beauties against rule. And even here, as he observes, from ver. 151 to 161, the offence is so glorious, and the fault so sublime, that the true critic will not dare either to censure or reform them. Yet still the poet is never to abandon himself to his imagination. The rules laid down for his conduct in this respect are these: 1. That though he transgress the letter of some one particular precept, yet that he be still careful to adhere to the end or spirit of them all, which end is the creation of one uniform perfect whole. And 2. That he have, in each instance, the authority of the dispensing power of the ancients to plead for him. These rules observed, this licence will be seldom used, and only when he is compelled by need, which will disarm the critic, and screen the offender from his laws.
Ver. 169. I know there are, &c.] But as some modern critics have pretended to say, that this last reason is only justifying one fault by another, our author goes on, from ver. 168 to 181, to vindicate the ancients; and to show that this presumptuous thought, as he calls it, proceeds from mere ignorance,—as where their partiality will not let them see that this licence is sometimes necessary for the symmetry and proportion of a perfect whole, in the light, and from the point, wherein it must be viewed; or where their haste will not give them time to observe, that a deviation from rule is for the sake of attaining some great and admirable purpose. These observations are further useful, as they tend to give modern critics an humbler opinion of their own abilities, and a higher of the authors they undertake to criticise. On which account he concludes with a fine reproof of their use of that common proverb perpetually in the mouths of the critics, "quandoque bonus dormitat Homerus;" misunderstanding the sense of Horace, and taking quandoque for aliquando:
Those oft are stratagems which errors seem,
Nor is it Homer nods, but we that dream.
Ver. 181. Still green with bays, &c.] But now fired with the name of Homer, and transported with the contemplation of those beauties which a cold critic can neither see nor conceive, the poet, from ver. 180 to 201, breaks out into a rapturous salutation of the rare felicity of those few ancients who have risen superior over time and accidents; and disdaining, as it were, any longer to reason with his critics, offers this as the surest confutation of their censures. Then with the humility of a suppliant at the shrine of immortals, and the sublimity of a poet participating of their fire, he turns again to these ancient worthies, and apostrophises their Manes:
Hail, bards triumphant! &c.
Ver. 200. T' admire superior sense, and doubt their own!] This line concludes the first division of the poem; in which we see the subject of the first and second part, and likewise the connexion they have with one another. It serves likewise to introduce the second. The effect of studying the ancients, as here recommended, would be the admiration of their superior sense, which, if it will not of itself dispose moderns to a diffidence of their own (one of the great uses, as well as natural fruits of that study), our author, to help forward their modesty, in his second part shows them (in a regular deduction of the causes and effects of wrong judgment) their own bright image and amiable turn of mind.
Ver. 201. Of all the causes, &c.] Having, in the first part, delivered rules for perfecting the art of criticism, the second is employed in explaining the impediments to it. The order of the two parts was well adjusted. For the causes of wrong judgment being pride, superficial learning, a bounded capacity, and partiality, they to whom this part is principally addressed, would not readily be brought either to see the malignity of the causes, or to own themselves concerned in the effects, had not the author previously both enlightened and convinced them, by the foregoing observations, on the vastness of art, and narrowness of wit; the extensive study of human nature and antiquity; and the characters of ancient poetry and criticism; the natural remedies to the four epidemic disorders he is now endeavouring to redress.
Ver. 201. Of all the causes, &c.] The first cause of wrong judgment is pride. He judiciously begins with this, from ver. 200 to 215, as on other accounts, so on this, that it is the very thing which gives modern criticism its character, whose complexion is abuse and censure. He calls it the vice of fools, by which term is not meant those to whom nature has given no judgment (for he is here speaking of what misleads the judgment), but those to whom learning and study have given more erudition than taste, as appears from the happy similitude of an ill-nourished body, where the same words which express the cause, express likewise the nature of pride:
For as in bodies, thus in souls, we find,
What wants in blood and spirits, swelled with wind.
It is the business of reason, he tells us, to dispel the cloud in which pride involves the mind: but the mischief is, that the rays of reason, diverted by self-love, sometime gild this cloud, instead of dispelling it. So that the judgment, by false lights reflected back upon itself, is still apt to be a little dazzled, and to mistake its object. He therefore advises to call in still more helps:
Trust not yourself; but your defects to know,
Make use of ev'ry friend and ev'ry foe.
Both the beginning and conclusion of this precept are remarkable. The question is of the means to subdue pride. He directs the critic to begin with a distrust of himself; and this is modesty, the first mortification of pride: and then to seek the assistance of others, and make use even of an enemy; and this is humility, the last mortification of pride: for when a man can once bring himself to submit to profit by an enemy, he has either already subdued his vanity, or is in a fair way of so doing.
Ver. 215. A little learning, &c.] We must here remark the poet's skill in his disposition of the causes obstructing true judgment. Each general cause which is laid down first, has its own particular cause in that which follows. Thus, the second cause of wrong judgment, superficial learning, is what occasions that critical pride, which he places first.
Ver. 216. Drink deep, &c.] Nature and learning are the pole-stars of all true criticism: but pride obstructs the view of nature; and a smattering of letters makes us insensible of our ignorance. To avoid this ridiculous situation, the poet, from ver. 214 to 233, advises, either to drink deep, or not to drink at all; for the least sip at this fountain is enough to make a bad critic, while even a moderate draught can never make a good one. And yet the labours and difficulties of drinking deep are so great, that a young author, "fired with ideas of fair Italy," and ambitious to snatch a palm from Rome, here engages in an undertaking like that of Hannibal: finely illustrated by the similitude of an inexperienced traveller penetrating through the Alps.
Ver. 233. A perfect judge, &c.] The third cause of wrong judgment is a narrow capacity; the natural cause of the foregoing defect, acquiescence in superficial learning. This bounded capacity our author shows, from ver. 232 to 384, betrays itself two ways: in its judgment both of the matter, and the manner of the work criticised. Of the matter, in judging by parts, or in having one favourite part to a neglect of all the rest. Of the manner, in confining men's regard only to conceit, or language, or numbers. This is our poet's order, and we shall follow him as it leads us, only just observing one general beauty which runs through this part of the poem; it is,—that under each of these heads of wrong judgment, he has intermixed excellent precepts for the right. We shall take notice of them as they occur.
He exposes the folly of judging by parts very artfully, not by a direct description of that sort of critic, but of his opposite, a perfect judge, &c. Nor is the elegance of this conversion less than the art; for as, in poetical style, one word or figure is still put for another, in order to catch new lights from distant images, and reflect them back upon the subject in hand, so in poetical matter one person or description may be commodiously employed for another, with the same advantage of representation. It is observable that our author makes it almost the necessary consequence of judging by parts, to find fault: and this not without much discernment: for the several parts of a complete whole, when seen only singly, and known only independently, must always have the appearance of irregularity,—often of deformity; because the poet's design being to create a resultive beauty from the artful assemblage of several various parts into one natural whole, those parts must be fashioned with regard to their mutual relations in the stations they occupy in that whole, from whence the beauty required is to arise; but that regard will occasion so unreducible a form in each part, when considered singly, as to present a very mis-shapen form.
Ver. 253. Whoever thinks a faultless piece to see,] He shows next, from ver. 252 to 263, that to fix our censure on single parts, though they happen to want an exactness consistent enough with their relation to the rest, is even then very unjust: and for these reasons:—1. Because it implies an expectation of a faultless piece, which is a vain fancy. 2. Because no more is to be expected of any work than that it fairly attains its end. But the end may be attained, and yet these trivial faults committed: therefore, in spite of such faults, the work will merit that praise that is due to everything which attains its end. 3. Because sometimes a great beauty is not to be procured, nor a notorious blemish to be avoided, but by suffering one of these minute and trivial errors. 4. And lastly, because the general neglect of them is a praise, as it is the indication of a genius, attentive to greater matters.
Ver 263. Most critics, fond of some subservient art, &c.] II. The second way in which a narrow capacity, as it relates to the matter, shows itself, is judging by a favourite part. The author has placed this, from ver. 262 to 285, after the other of judging by parts, with great propriety, it being indeed a natural consequence of it. For when men have once left the whole to turn their attention to the separate parts, that regard and reverence due only to a whole is fondly transferred to one or other of its parts. And thus we see, that heroes themselves, as well as hero-makers, even kings, as well as poets and critics, when they chance never to have had, or long to have lost the idea of that which is the only legitimate object of their office, the care and conservation of the whole, are wont to devote themselves to the service of some favourite part, whether it be love of money, military glory, despotic power, &c. And all, as our author says on this occasion,
to one loved folly sacrifice.
This general misconduct much recommends that maxim in good poetry and politics, to give a principal attention to the whole,—a maxim which our author has elsewhere shown to be equally true likewise in morals and religion, as being founded in the order of things; for if we examine we shall find the misconduct here complained of to arise from this imbecility of our nature, that the mind must always have something to rest upon, to which the passions and affections may be interestingly directed. Nature prompts us to seek it in the most worthy objects; and reason points us to a whole, or system: but the false lights which the passions hold out confound and dazzle us: we stop short; and, before we get to a whole, take up with some part, which thenceforth becomes our favourite.
| Ver. 285. | Thus critics of less judgment than caprice, |
| Curious not knowing, not exact but nice, | |
| Form short ideas, &c.] |
2. He concludes his observations on those two sorts of judges by parts, with this general reflection:—The curious not knowing are the first sort, who judge by parts, and with a microscopic sight (as he says elsewhere) examine bit by bit. The not exact but nice, are the second, who judge by a favourite part, and talk of a whole to cover their fondness for a part, as philosophers do of principles, in order to obtrude notions and opinions in their stead. But the fate common to both is, to be governed by caprice and not by judgment, and consequently to form short ideas, or to have ideas short of truth; though the latter sort, through a fondness to their favourite part, imagine that it comprehends the whole in epitome, as the famous hero of La Mancha, mentioned just before, used to maintain, that knight errantry comprised within itself the quintessence of all science, civil, military, and religious.
Ver. 289. Some to conceit alone, &c.] We come now to that second sort of bounded capacity, which betrays itself in its judgment on the manner of the work criticised. And this our author prosecutes from ver. 288 to 384. These are again subdivided into divers classes.
Ver. 289. Some to conceit alone, &c.] The first, from ver. 288 to 305, are those who confine their attention solely to conceit or wit. And here again the critic by parts, offends doubly in the manner, just as he did in the matter; for he not only confines his attention to a part, when it should be extended to the whole, but he likewise judges falsely of that part. And this, as the other, is unavoidable, the parts in the manner bearing the same close relation to the whole, that the parts in the matter do; to which whole, the ideas of this critic have never yet extended. Hence it is, that our author, speaking here of those who confine their attention solely to conceit or wit, describes the distinct species of true and false wit, because they not only mistake a wrong disposition of true wit for a right, but likewise false wit for true. He describes false wit first, from ver. 288 to 297,
Some to conceit alone, &c.,
where the reader may observe our author's address in representing, in a description of false wit, the false disposition of the true; as the critic by parts is apt to fall into both these errors.
He next describes true wit, from ver. 296 to 305,
True wit is nature to advantage dressed, &c.
And here again the reader may observe the same beauty; not only an explanation of true wit, but likewise of the right disposition of it, which the poet illustrates, as he did the wrong, by ideas taken from the art of painting, in the theory of which he was exquisitely skilled.
Ver. 305. Others for language, &c.] He proceeds secondly to those contracted critics, whose whole concern turns upon language, and shows, from ver. 304 to 337, that this quality, where it holds the principal place in a work, deserves no commendation:—1. Because it excludes qualities more essential. And when the abounding verbiage has choked and suffocated the sense, the writer will be obliged to varnish over the mischief with all the false colouring of eloquence. 2. Secondly, because the critic who busies himself with this quality alone, is unable to make a right judgment of it; because true expression is only the dress of thought, and so must be perpetually varied according to the subject, and manner of treating it. But those who never concern themselves with the sense, can form no judgment of the correspondence between that and the language.
Expression is the dress of thought, and still
Appears more decent, as more suitable, &c.
Now as these critics are ignorant of this correspondence, their whole judgment in language is reduced to verbal criticism, or the examination of single words; and generally those which are most to his taste, are (for an obvious reason) such as smack most of antiquity, on which account our author has bestowed a little raillery upon it; concluding with a short and proper direction concerning the use of words, so far as regards their novelty and ancientry.
Ver. 337. But most by numbers judge, &c.] The last sort are those, from ver. 336 to 384, whose ears are attached only to the harmony of a poem. Of which they judge as ignorantly and as perversely as the other sort did of the eloquence, and for the same reason. Our author first describes that false harmony with which they are so much captivated; and shows that it is wretchedly flat and unvaried: for
Smooth or rough, with them, is right or wrong.
He then describes the true: 1. As it is in itself, constant; with a happy mixture of strength and sweetness, in contradiction to the roughness and flatness of false harmony: and 2. As it is varied in compliance to the subject, where the sound becomes an echo to the sense, so far as is consistent with the preservation of numbers, in contradiction to the monotony of false harmony. Of this he gives us, in the delivery of his precepts, four beautiful examples of smoothness, roughness, slowness, and rapidity. The first use of this correspondence of the sound to the sense, is to aid the fancy in acquiring a perfecter and more lively image of the thing represented. A second and nobler, is to calm and subdue the turbulent and selfish passions, and to raise and warm the beneficent, which he illustrates in the famous adventure of Timotheus and Alexander, where, in referring to Mr. Dryden's Ode on that subject, he turns it to a high compliment on his favourite poet.
Ver. 384. Avoid extremes, &c.] Our author is now come to the last cause of wrong judgment, partiality,—the parent of the immediately preceding cause, a bounded capacity, nothing so much narrowing and contracting the mind as prejudices entertained for or against things or persons. This, therefore, as the main root of all the foregoing, he prosecutes at large, from ver. 383 to 474. First, to ver. 394, he previously exposes that capricious turn of mind, which, by running into extremes, either of praise or dispraise, lays the foundation of an habitual partiality. He cautions, therefore, both against one and the other; and with reason; for excess of praise is the mark of a bad taste; and excess of censure, of a bad digestion.
Ver. 394. Some foreign writers, &c.] Having explained the disposition of mind which produces an habitual partiality, he proceeds to expose this partiality in all the shapes in which it appears both amongst the unlearned and the learned.
I. In the unlearned it is seen, first, in an unreasonable fondness for, or aversion to, our own or foreign, to ancient or modern writers. And as it is the mob of unlearned readers he is here speaking of, he exposes their folly in a very apposite similitude:
Thus wit, like faith, by each man is applied
To one small sect, and all are damned beside.
But he shows, from ver. 396 to 408, that these critics have as wrong notions of reason as those bigots have of God; for that genius is not confined to times or climates; but, as the common gift of nature, is extended throughout all ages and countries; that indeed this intellectual light, like the material light of the sun, may not shine at all times, and in every place with equal splendour, but be sometimes clouded with popular ignorance, and sometimes again eclipsed by the discountenance of the great; yet it shall still recover itself, and, by breaking through the strongest of these impediments, manifest the eternity of its nature.
Ver. 408. Some ne'er advance a judgment of their own,] A second instance of unlearned partiality is (as he shows from ver. 407 to 424) men's going always along with the cry, as having no fixed nor well-grounded principles whereon to raise any judgment of their own. A third is reverence for names, of which sort, as he well observes, the worst and vilest are the idolizers of names of quality; whom therefore he stigmatises as they deserve. Our author's temper as well as his judgment is here seen, in throwing this species of partiality amongst the unlearned critics. His affection for letters would not suffer him to conceive, that any learned critic could ever fall into so low a prostitution.
Ver. 424. The vulgar thus—As oft the learned—] II. He comes in the second place, from ver. 423 to 452, to consider the instances of partiality in the learned. 1. The first is singularity. For, as want of principles, in the unlearned, necessitates them to rest on the common judgment as always right, so adherence to false principles (that is, to notions of their own) mislead the learned into the other extreme of supposing the common judgment always wrong. And as, before, our author compared those to bigots, who made true faith to consist in believing after others, so he compares these to schismatics, who make it to consist in believing as no one ever believed before, which folly he marks with a lively stroke of humour in the turn of the thought:
So schismatics the plain believers quit,
And are but damned for having too much wit.
2. The second is novelty. And as this proceeds sometimes from fondness, sometimes from vanity, he compares the one to the passion for a mistress, and the other to the pride of being in fashion; but the excuse common to both is, the daily improvement of their judgment:
Ask them the cause; they're wiser still they say;
And still to-morrow's wiser than to-day.
Now as this is a plausible pretence for their inconstancy, and our author has himself afterwards approved of it, as a remedy against obstinacy and pride, where he says, ver. 570,
But you with pleasure own your errors past,
And make each day a critique on the last,
he has been careful, by the turn of the expression in this place, to show the difference between the pretence and the remedy. For time, considered only as duration, vitiates as frequently as it improves. Therefore to expect wisdom as the necessary attendant of length of days, unrelated to long experience, is vain and delusive. This he illustrates by a remarkable example, where we see time, instead of becoming wiser, destroying good letters, to substitute school divinity in their place; the genius of which kind of learning, the character of its professors, and the fate, which, sooner or later, always attends whatsoever is wrong or false, the poet sums up in those four lines:
Faith, gospel, all, seemed made to be disputed, &c.
And in conclusion he observes, that perhaps this mischief, from love of novelty, might not be so great, did it not, along with the critic, infect the writer likewise, who, when he finds his readers disposed to take ready wit on the standard of current folly, never troubles himself to think of better payment.
Ver. 452. Some valuing those of their own side or mind, &c.] 3. The third and last instance of partiality in the learned, is party and faction, which is considered from ver. 451 to 474, where he shows how men of this turn deceive themselves, when they load a writer of their own side with commendation. They fancy they are paying tribute to merit, when they are only sacrificing to self-love. But this is not the worst. He further shows, that this party spirit has often very ill effects on science itself, while, in support of faction, it labours to depress some rising genius, that was, perhaps, raised by nature to enlighten his age and country. By which he would insinuate, that all the baser and viler passions seek refuge, and find support in party madness.
Ver. 474. Be thou the first, &c.] The poet having now gone through the last cause of wrong judgment, and the root of all the rest, partiality, and ended his remarks upon it with a detection of the two rankest kinds, those which arise out of party rage and envy, takes the occasion, which this affords him, of closing his second division in the most graceful manner, from ver. 473 to 560, by concluding from the premises, and calling upon the true critic to be careful of his charge, which is the protection and support of wit; for, the defence of it from malevolent censure is its true protection, and the illustration of its beauties, is its true support.
He first shows, the critic ought to do this service without loss of time, and on these motives:—1. Out of regard to himself, for there is some merit in giving the world notice of an excellence, but little or none, in pointing, like an index, to the beaten road of admiration. 2. Out of regard to the poem, for the short duration of modern works requires that they should begin to live betimes. He compares the life of modern wit (which in a changeable dialect, must soon pass away), and that of the ancient (which survives in an universal language), to the difference between the patriarchal age and our own, and observes, that while the ancient writings live for ever, as it were, in brass and marble, the modern are but like paintings, which, of how masterly a hand soever, have no sooner gained their requisite perfection by the softening and ripening of their tints, which they do in a very few years, but they begin to fade and die away. 3. Lastly, our author shows that the critic ought in justice to do this service out of regard to the poet, when he considers the slender dowry the muse brings along with her. In youth it is only a vain and short-lived pleasure; and in maturer years, an accession of care and labour, in proportion to the weight of reputation to be sustained, and of the increase of envy to be opposed: and therefore, concludes his reasoning on this head with that pathetic and insinuating address to the critic, from ver. 508 to 526.
Ah! let not learning, &c.
Ver. 526. But if in noble minds some dregs remain, &c.] So far as to what ought to be the true critic's principal study and employment. But if the sour critical humour abounds, and must therefore needs have vent, he directs to its proper object, and shows, from ver. 525 to 556, how it may be innocently and usefully pointed. This is very observable; our author had made spleen and disdain the characteristic of the false critic, and yet here supposes them inherent in the true. But it is done with judgment, and a knowledge of nature. For as bitterness and astringency in unripe fruits of the best kind are the foundation and capacity of that high spirit, race, and flavour which we find in them, when perfectly concocted by the warmth and influence of the sun, and which, without those qualities, would gain no more by that influence than only a mellow insipidity, so spleen and disdain in the true critic, when improved by long study and experience, ripen into an exactness of judgment and an elegance of taste, although, in the false critic, lying remote from the influence of good letters, they remain in all their first offensive harshness and acerbity. The poet therefore shows how, after the exaltation of these qualities into their state of perfection, the very dregs (which, though precipitated, may possibly, on some occasions, rise and ferment even in a noble mind) may be usefully employed, that is to say, in branding obscenity and impiety. Of these, he explains the rise and progress, in a beautiful picture of the different geniuses of the two reigns of Charles II. and William III. The former of which gave course to the most profligate luxury; the latter to a licentious impiety. These are the crimes our author assigns over to the caustic hand of the critic; but concludes however, from ver. 555 to 560, with this necessary admonition, to take care not to be misled into unjust censure, either on the one hand, by a pharisaical niceness, or on the other by a self-consciousness of guilt. And thus the second division of his Essay ends: the judicious conduct of which is worthy our observation. The subjects of it are the causes of wrong judgment. These he derives upwards from cause to cause, till he brings them to their source, an immoral partiality: for as he had, in the first part,
traced the Muses upward to their spring,
and shown them to be derived from heaven, and the offspring of virtue, so hath he here pursued this enemy of the muses, the bad critic, to his low original, in the arms of his nursing mother immorality. This order naturally introduces, and at the same time shows the necessity of, the subject of the third and last division, which is, on the morals of the critic.
Ver. 560. Learn then, &c.] We enter now on the third part, the morals of the critic. There seemed a peculiar necessity of inculcating precepts of this sort to the critic, by reason of that native acerbity so often found in the profession; of which, a short memorial will soon convince the reader, and at the same time inform him why our author has here included all critical morals in candour, modesty, and good breeding. When, in these latter ages, human learning reared its head in the West, and its tail, verbal criticism, was of course to rise with it, the madness of critics presently became so offensive, that the sober stupidity of the monks might appear the more tolerable evil. J. Argyropylus, a mercenary Greek, who came to teach school in Italy after the sacking of Constantinople by the Turk, used to maintain that Cicero understood neither philosophy nor Greek; while another of his countrymen, J. Lascaris by name, threatened to demonstrate that Virgil was no poet. However, these men raised in the west of Europe an appetite for the Greek language. So that Hermolaus Barbarus, a noted critic and most passionate admirer of it, used to boast that he had invoked and raised the devil, about the meaning of the Aristotelian εντελεχεια. As this man was famous for his enchantments, so one, whom Balzac speaks of, was as useful to letters by his revelations, and was wont to say, that the meaning of such a verse in Persius, no one knew but God and himself. But they were not all so modest. The celebrated Pomponius Lætus, in excess of veneration for antiquity, became a real pagan, raised altars to Romulus, and sacrificed to the gods of Greece. But if the Greeks cried down Cicero, the Italian critics knew how to support his credit. Every one has heard of the childish excesses into which the fondness for being thought Ciceronians carried the most celebrated Italians of this time. They generally abstained from reading the scripture for fear of spoiling their style, and Cardinal Bembo used to call the epistles of St. Paul by the contemptuous name of epistolaccias,—great overgrown epistles. But Erasmus cured this frenzy in that masterpiece of good sense, entitled Ciceronianus, for which, as lunatics treat their physicians, the elder Scaliger insulted him with all the brutal fury peculiar to his family and profession. His son Joseph and Salmasius had such endowments of art and nature as might have made them public blessings; yet how did these savages tear and worry one another. The choicest of Joseph's flowers of speech were stercus diaboli, and lutum stercore maceratum. It is true these were strewn upon his enemies. He treated his friends better; for in a letter to Thuanus, speaking of two of them, Clavius and Lipsius, he calls the first "a monster of ignorance," and the other "a slave to the Jesuits" and an "idiot." But so great was his love of sacred amity, that he says, at the same time, "I still keep up a correspondence with him, notwithstanding his idiotry, for it is my principle to be constant in my friendships.—Je ne reste de lui écrire nonobstant son idioterie, d'autant que je suis constant en amitié." The character he gives of his own work, in the same letter, is no less extraordinary: "Vous vous pouvez assurer que nostre Eusebe sera un tresor des merveilles de la doctrine chronologique." But this modest account of his chronology is a trifle in comparison of the just esteem Salmasius conceived of himself, as Mr. Colomies tells the story: This critic one day meeting two of his brethren, Messrs. Gaulmin and Maussac, in the royal library at Paris, Gaulmin, in a virtuous consciousness of their importance, told the other two that he believed they three could make head against all the learned in Europe. To which the great Salmasius fiercely replied, "Do you and Mr. Maussac join yourselves to all that is learned in the world, and you shall find that I alone am a match for you all." Vossius tells us that, when Laur. Valla had snarled at every name of the first order in antiquity, such as Aristotle, Cicero, and one whom I should have thought this critic was likeliest to pass by, the redoubtable Priscian, he impiously boasted that he had arms even against Christ himself. But Codrus Urcæus went further, and actually used those arms the other only threatened with. This man while he was preparing some trifling piece of criticism for the press, had the misfortune to hear his papers were burned, on which he is reported to have broke out, "Quodnam ego tantum scelus concepi, O Christe; quem ego tuorum unquam læsi, ut ita inexpiabili in me odio debaccheris? Audi ea, quæ tibi mentis compos et ex animo dicam. Si forte, cum ad ultimam vitæ finem pervenero, supplex accedam ad te oratum, neve audias, neve inter tuos accipias oro; cum infernis Diis in æternum vitam agere decrevi." Whereupon, says my author, he quitted the converse of men, threw himself into the thickest of a forest, and there wore out the wretched remains of life in all the agonies of despair.
But to return to the poem. This third and last part is in two divisions. In the first of which, from ver. 559 to 631, our author inculcates the morals by precept. In the second, from ver. 630 to the end, by example. His first precept, from ver. 561 to 566, recommends candour, for its use to the critic, and to the writer criticised.
2. The second, from ver. 565 to 572, recommends modesty, which manifests itself in these four signs: 1. Silence where it doubts,
Be silent always when you doubt your sense;
2. A seeming diffidence where it knows,
And speak, though sure, with seeming diffidence;
3. A free confession of error where wrong,
But you with pleasure own your errors past;
4. And a constant review and scrutiny even of those opinions which it still thinks right.
And make each day a critique on the last.
3. The third, from ver. 571 to 584, recommends good-breeding, which will not force truth dogmatically upon men, as ignorant of it, but gently insinuates it to them, as not sufficiently attentive to it. But as men of breeding are apt to fall into two extremes, he prudently cautions against them. The one is a backwardness in communicating their knowledge, out of a false delicacy, and for fear of being thought pedants: the other, and much more common extreme, is a mean complaisance, which those who are worthy of your advice do not need, to make it acceptable; for such can best bear reproof in particular points, who best deserve commendation in general.
Ver. 584. 'Twere well might critics, &c.] The poet having thus recommended in his general rules of conduct for the judgment, these three critical virtues to the heart, shows next, from ver. 583 to 631, upon what three sorts of writers these virtues, together with the advice conveyed under them, would be thrown away; and which is worse, be repaid with obloquy and scorn. These are the false critic, the dull man of quality, and the bad poet, each of which species of incorrigible writers he hath very exactly painted. But having drawn the last of them at full length, and being always attentive to the two main branches of his subject, which are, of writing and judging well, he re-assumes the character of the bad critic (whom he had touched upon before), to contrast him with the other; and makes the characteristic common to both, to be a never-ceasing repetition of their own impertinence.
The poet—still runs on in a raging vein, &c. ver. 606, &c.
The critic—with his own tongue still edifies his ears, 614, &c.
Than which there cannot be an observation more just, or more grounded on experience.
Ver. 631. But where's the man, &c.] II. The second division of this last part, which we now come to, is of the morals of critics, by example. For, having in the first, drawn a picture of the false critic, at large, he breaks out into an apostrophe, containing an exact and finished character of the true, which, at the same time, serves for an easy and proper introduction to this second division. For having asked, from ver. 630 to 643, Where's the man, &c., he answers, from ver. 642 to 681, that he was to be found in the happier ages of Greece and Rome; in the characters of Aristotle and Horace, Dionysius and Petronius, Quintilian and Longinus, whose several excellencies he has not only well distinguished, but has contrasted them with a peculiar elegance. The profound science and logical method of Aristotle is opposed to the plain common sense of Horace, conveyed in a natural and familiar negligence; the study and refinement of Dionysius, to the gay and courtly ease of Petronius; and the gravity and minuteness of Quintilian, to the vivacity and general topics of Longinus. Nor has the poet been less careful in these examples, to point out their eminence in the several critical virtues he so carefully inculcated in his precepts. Thus in Horace he particularizes his candour; in Petronius, his good-breeding; in Quintilian, his free and copious instruction; and in Longinus, his great and noble spirit.
Ver. 681. Thus long succeeding critics, &c.] The next period in which the true critic, he tells us, appeared, was at the revival and restoration of letters in the West. This occasions his giving a short history, from ver. 682 to 709, of the decline and re-establishment of arts and sciences in Italy. He shows that they both fell under the same enemy, despotic power; and that when both had made some little efforts to recover themselves, they were soon again overwhelmed by a second deluge of another kind, namely, superstition; and a calm of dulness finished upon Rome and letters what the rage of barbarism had begun:
A second deluge learning thus o'er-run,
And the monk finished what the Goth begun.
When things had long remained in this condition, and all hopes of recovery now seemed desperate, it was a critic, our author shows us, for the honour of the art he here teaches, who at length broke the charm of dulness, who dissipated the enchantment, and, like another Hercules, drove those cowled and hooded serpents from the Hesperian tree of knowledge, which they had so long guarded from human approach.
Ver. 697. But see! each Muse, in Leo's golden days,] This presents us with the second period in which the true critic appeared, of whom he has given us a complete idea in the single example of Marcus Hieronymus Vida; for his subject being poetical criticism, for the use principally of a critical poet, his example is an eminent poetical critic, who had written of the Art of Poetry in verse.
Ver. 709. But soon by impious arms, &c.] This brings us to the third period, after learning had travelled still further West, when the arms of the Emperor, in the sack of Rome by the Duke of Bourbon, had driven it out of Italy, and forced it to pass the mountains. The examples he gives in this period, are of Boileau in France, and of the Lord Roscommon and the Duke of Buckingham in England: and these were all poets, as well as critics in verse. It is true, the last instance is of one who was no eminent poet, the late Mr. Walsh. This small deviation might be well overlooked, were it only for its being a pious office to the memory of his friend. But it may be further justified, as it was an homage paid in particular to the morals of the critic, nothing being more amiable than the character here drawn of this excellent person. He being our author's judge and censor, as well as friend, it gives him a graceful opportunity to add himself to the number of the later critics; and with a character of his own genius and temper sustained by that modesty and dignity which it is so difficult to make consistent, this performance concludes.
I have here given a short and plain account of the Essay on Criticism, concerning which, I have but one thing more to say, that when the reader considers the regularity of the plan, the masterly conduct of each part, the penetration into nature, and the compass of learning so conspicuous throughout, he should at the same time know, it was the work of an author who had not attained the twentieth year of his age.